Healing Part 1: Priests

The time has come to explore the wonderful world of healing. There will be 4 posts, one for each healing class, discussing strengths and weaknesses, popular builds, basic strategies, and best spell rotations. We'll start off with the priests, since they are by far the most difficult class to master :-P

Strengths:

I mean this is a serious tone somewhat. Most people think that paladins can be better single target healers than priests. This can be somewhat true. Paladins are excellent single-target healers. But so are priests. We get a HOT, which means extra healing for that target in case we get silenced, CCed, or have our attention diverted temporarily by a rogue who pulled agro. We also have a mana efficient heal in Greater Heal.

Priests are also excellent at healing a raid. With Renews, low ranks of Greater Heal, and Prayer of Healing, we can efficiently heal a group.

Finally, we have the best threat mechanics of any class. We can get 20% reduction, but we also get spells like Prayer of Mending which cause no threat and Binding Heal which causes half threat. We have an arsenal of heals like no other.

Weaknesses:

So what are our weaknesses? We cannot, and should not, spam heals. Priests are most effective when timing their heals to be bunched together, leaving maximum time for mana regen. We are kinda a jack of all trades as well. If you need an unassigned healer to just heal anyone who takes incidental damage? Talk to a druid. A single target healer? A paladin or a shaman. We are good at lots of things, but not the best at all things. This is why most high end guilds have priests going shadow.

We also have an unreliable method of getting mana back. Druids get innervate, shamans get mana tide totem, we get shadowfiend (which is great for some fights, crappy for others).

Common talent builds:

There is really a range of builds, and they go from 28/33/0 (PVP healer) to 18/43/0 (PVE healer). The highlights of most builds are Meditation, Divine Spirit, and Improved Healing. Most raiding priests go 23/38/0 that I've seen. It's the least diversified healing class since the important talents are spread out among two trees. You won't see any 0/61/0 priests.

Basic Strategies:

The most important strategy for a priest is to REGEN MANA. Priests get an incredible amount of mana from their spirit. Druids and priests need spirit to last as long as a paladin or shaman healing. What this means though is concentrating on your spell rotation...

Spell Rotation


Most priests focus on using Greater Heal, Renew, and Prayer of Mending, with a Prayer of Healing if needed in a group.

Here is the key. Don't spam any of them. I almost always follow this cast sequence. Greater Heal -> Renew/POM. Wait. Greater Heal -> POM/Renew Wait. This will usually keep a tank up for most fights if you have enough +healing. It also maximizes your regen. Sure your Renew may be ready to be applied again before you cast it. But that extra regen time makes a difference. Try to make it so that your Greater Heal gets the tank to full. If it takes 2, then cast 2. The worst thing that can happen is to need to continuously heal a tank with Greater Heals. This means that you should think about acquiring more +healing. Having the ability to regen your mana in between GHeals makes a huge difference when in a long boss fight.

Best stats:

My favorite stats are spirit (MP5) and +healing. Spirit is great for long fights and regen. Plus you can get talent points that increase your +healing based on your spirit. MP5 helps for those times when you need to spam heals, say when the tank takes a string of crits all at once.

+Healing follows spirit, because the bigger your heals are, the less frequently you have to heal. Also, remember that if your heals get too big, you can always downrank.

After this comes intellect (more mana pool), stamina (gotta stay alive), and potentially +crit if you have inspiration especially. But spirit and healing are the big ones. MP5 goes with spirit. It's a huge one as well.

Final comments:

Again, the priest class is the hardest to master imo, because of the importance of knowing when to cast what spell. When to regen and when to heal. What gear to wear for what fights. The biggest key that I tell people is to try to stick to a rotation. If you find yourself deviating too much, then either itemize differently, or try a different rotation...everyone's is different.